Search Engine Marketing Blog

For the person on the desert island that hasn’t yet heard about the most recent PR update and how it’s supposedly due to Google penalising link sellers and buyers here’s a few links to interesting posts:

Forbes article that’s a few days old but interesting “background” reading (hey, it’s a fast paced industry!)

Andy Beard’s detailed look at the directories affected - good cause he tracks the directories’ PR over time

ShoeMoney’s short but sweet post - please follow the links to find out what NOT to do

Some Musings from Search Engine Journal - I love the quote, “PageRank is not a Marketing Metric”. Perfect!

I’ve got 20 minutes in which to find a club to book for a party. Someone recommends the Gardening Club in Covent Garden. I find the website address using Google and I’m on the site. I’m looking, I’m looking, I’m looking and I just cannot find a phone number! In frustration I announce this fact to the office at large and within 5 seconds someone yells out the phone number. I call, they have the VIP room available and it’s booked! Yeah! Party time.

So where’d my colleague find the phone number? “On Bizwiki”. Of course.

Google has recently made a shift to giving greater prominence to individual company websites instead of online directories. One would think that this is a good move and in the interest of the searcher, but is it?

That all depends on how many company websites are set up to actually give their readers information as opposed to graphics, difficult layouts and unintelligible marketing speak.

Have a look through a few company websites. Are their contact details immediately available? Does their homepage tell you in no uncertain terms who they are, what they do, if they can help you and how you can get in touch?

You’d think companies would make sure such important information is in the forefront, clearly visible and un-missable. Well, think again. If it’s not completely absent, it’s buried several levels down the site structure or on a page that you wouldn’t expect it to be on (which would be Home, About or Contact – businesses take note).

And then of course is the problem of trying to find the company website on search engines. Too few business sites are designed to be found by the search engines and the lack of informative content, the basis on which search engine results are ranked, really doesn’t help. Of course, some businesses don’t even have a website yet.

So yes, there is a need for online phone books and business directories. Until such a time as every business has a website and each one is developed so as to give its reader an at a glance overview of its products, services, location and contact details searchers will continue to find online directories such as Bizwiki to be the more useful option.

Now that the furor is dying down over Virgil’s WikiScanner some helpful souls are moving the conversation towards how companies should manage their reputation on Wikipedia. It’s starting to sound like White Hat SEO banter - “Don’t do anything that would upset Wikipedia”. There’s an article over at Search Engine Land by a Wikipedia editor that gives advice on how to get incorrect or slanderous content removed from your Wikipedia page which says, in short: Don’t do it yourself. The comments got so contentious that Danny closed them down before I had a chance to post.

Why doesn’t Wikipedia want you to edit information about yourself or your company? Their position is that someone who is too close to a company/person/topic may not be able to provide the neutrality Wikipedia prides itself on. Fair enough, but what if you want to correct an obvious flaw in the article about you or your company? Are you really going to wait around for some Wikipedia “angel” to swoop down and edit it for you?

I am in complete agreement that Wikipedia articles should be kept neutral and unbiased but I do not agree that just because you are “close” to the company you are unable to edit the article in the correct manner. I am not referring here to whitewashing or spin tactics, I’m talking about fixing obvious errors such as spelling mistakes, dates, numbers and other openly verifiable facts.

10 ways to cheat at link building. Quick, easy tips to get you and your new site going.

1. Directories - quick, easy, fast submissions. Usually free, sometimes a small fee. Links are usually set up in a timely fashion. Find suitable directories at the Open Directory.

2. Buy a Yahoo directory link.

3. Ask people you know - personal friends, family members, your kid’s school, your golf club, people you met on holiday - anyone you know who owns, or knows someone who owns, a site.

4. Arrange with your business partners to do a Partners page - you normally refer them to customers so why not refer them on your site and get them to refer you by linking to you.

5. Ask satisfied business customers for an endorsement. You add their testimonial on your site with a link to theirs and they add you as a preferred supplier on their site with a link to yours.

6. Don’t have a news page, have a blog instead. Just for having a blog you qualify for links a normal site can’t get - there’s a whole Dmoz section devoted to weblogs not to mention all the blog specific directories. Use the blog for posting news, press releases, product recalls, job openings, sponsorships, and so on. If you post something that’s actually interesting to someone you’ll get links without having to ask. Blogging software is like a free, easy to install content management system that can be administered by just about anyone who can type and you don’t have to give them access to the rest of your site.

7. Put up a “Link to Me” sign on your site with code for a professional looking button that people can simply cut and paste into their own site’s code.

8. Offer a “Listed On” or award button link for any site that qualifies. Believe it or not sites are still willing to stick an award or “Listed On” button link on their site.

9. Every time you do a press release make sure it carries your website address and is distributed to the online press release services.

10. Let other sites use your content providing they link back to your site. White papers, studies, surveys, research, product recall notices, tips, articles, jokes, anything that you post on your site that other sites may wish to use. Stick a politely worded permission note on the bottom of the content page letting other site owners know they are welcome to use the material - all you ask is that they credit the content to you using a direct link.

Ok, so there is no completely lazy way of getting links. Didn’t your Daddy ever tell you that anything worth doing is worth doing well?